Sunday, June 27, 2010

DTN News: US Drone Strike Kills Six Militants In Pakistan

(NSI News Source Info) MIRANSHAH, Pakistan- June 27, 2010: A US drone attack killed six militants Sunday in Pakistan's North Waziristan district, a stronghold of Taliban and Al-Qaeda cohorts on the Afghan border, officials said.The attack targeted a militant compound in Tabbi Torkhel village about four kilometres (2.5 miles) north of Miranshah, the main town in the lawless tribal district."The death toll has gone up to six," a security official said.A local administration official confirmed the attack and the casualties.The missiles hit a compound and also destroyed a vehicle belonging to the militants, he said, adding: "The identity of the militants was not immediately known as the bodies were mutilated." Local officials said there was no immediate report of a "high-value" target among the dead.The attack was the latest in the surge of drone strikes in North Waziristan, where Pakistani commanders have come under increasing US pressure to carry out a military offensive.More than 900 people have been killed in nearly 100 drone strikes in Pakistan since August 2008, including a number of senior militants. However the attacks fuel anti-American sentiment in the conservative Muslim country.A similar drone strike killed two militants and wounded two others on Saturday, security officials said.The US military does not, as a rule, confirm drone attacks, but its armed forces and the Central Intelligence Agency operating in Afghanistan are the only forces that deploy pilotless drones in the region.Militants based in the rugged terrain attack US-led forces across the border in Afghanistan, where the Afghan Taliban are waging a nearly nine-year insurgency to evict the estimated 140,000 foreign troops.On June 1, Al-Qaeda said its number three leader and Osama bin Laden's one-time treasurer Mustafa Abu al-Yazid had been killed in what security officials said was an apparent drone strike in North Waziristan.Washington has branded the tribal belt a global headquarters of Al-Qaeda and officials say it is home to Islamist extremists.Waziristan came under renewed scrutiny when Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani-American charged over an attempted bombing in New York on May 1, allegedly told US interrogators he had been there for bomb training.Pakistani commanders have not ruled out an offensive in North Waziristan, but argue that gains elsewhere need to be consolidated to prevent their troops being stretched too thin.